I watched the second Fugitive Alien first, back in 2022. I watched this second because of the order it aired for the original season of Mystery Science Theater 3000. (They later fixed the order for the proper show.) Not that it matters. If you don’t already know, this is just two episodes of a Japanese …
Tag: 1986
Travels in Hyperreality (1986) by Umberto Eco
This is a collection of what appear to be pieces primarily written for Italian newspapers. (However some of the pieces in the latter sections appear too academic for newspapers.) It is kind of scattershot, with pretty brief pieces and longer pieces, on all sorts of topics of concern to Italians in the 1970s and ’80s.
America 3000 (1986, David Engelbach)
I just spent 15 minutes looking for a Canada 3000 ad with the appropriate jingle to led off this review. I couldn’t find it. Just know that, through the entirety of this bad ’80s post apocalyptic comedy, I was singing “Merica 3000” in my mind to the tune of that jingle.
Throwing Muses (1986)
I didn’t really know what I was getting into here. I thought I knew what this band sounded like and I was kind of surprised they had existed as long as they did. And then “Call Me” started and I was like “Wait, what? They’re a (UK) post punk band???”
Forever Breathes the Lonely World (1986) by Felt
Jangle pop with a post punk aesthetic. It made more sense to me when it was earlier in the 1980s. (I guess I mean that it made more sense when it was earlier in their career.)
The Way It Is (1986) by Bruce Hornsby and the Range
I know basically nothing about Bruce Hornsby. I remember seeing his name on a Mix 99.9 ad on the subway in high school. And I know he toured with the Dead. That’s all I got.
Duotones (1986) by Kenny G
Upon reflection it seems kind of cruel to assume that Kenny G isn’t actually a good saxophone player just because he doesn’t have taste. If I learned one thing from this preposterously popular record, it’s that Kenny G can indeed play. Now, that begs the question, what is worse, someone who has talent and uses …
Express (1986) by Love and Rockets
I spent way too much time in my review of Earth Sun Moon obsessing over how these guys weren’t Bauhaus. It’s a weird review that I find hard to read now. I wish I had focused on the music so I could try to compare the two records and understand why I appear to have …
Blood and Chocolate (1986) by Elvis Costello and the Attractions
At some point a career goes on long enough where it starts to divide the true fans from the people who just got into the artist because they were in the ether, but sometimes the critics will continue to care and sometimes they won’t. I don’t know where exactly that point is with Costello but …
Word Up! (1986) by Cameo
Like so much other music released in 1986, this sounds extremely “modern” or, perhaps more appropriately to us 21st century folks, “contemporary.” It’s aggressively of its era, which is a good thing for some people I suppose, though obviously not for me.
Guitars, Cadillacs, Etc., Etc. (1984, 1986) by Dwight Yoakam
Country is a weird genre. It’s like folk or R&B in the sense that genre purity makes a little more sense than it does in other genres. Every so often in country and folk, there is a return to something (mostly) more traditional. And there always seems to be a need for it. But, unlike …
Slipper When Wet (1986) by Bon Jovi
Bon Jovi broke when I was too young to really be aware of them – I was not yet five when this album came out. And they had peaked before I was really conscious of the music on mainstream radio – my family listened to oldies stations – and before I was conscious of my …
Especially for You (1986) by The Smithereens
Like many people, I’m probably listening to this – and taking it seriously – in part because of Kurt Cobain. I did not enjoy Green Thoughts but it’s been long enough that I forgot about that, so I was able to approach this with fresh ears and be more charitable to it than I would …
Back in the High Life (1986) by Steve Winwood
Traffic are one of those bands I want to love more than I actually do. They’re one of those bands who might have been All Time great had they just had a great songwriter. There are so many moments in their music that I get really excited about, but then the quality of the songs …
True Blue (1986) by Madonna
Much like Madonna’s first couple of albums, there’s rather a lot of relative musical diversity here, which makes it a lot easier for someone like me, who does not like dance pop, to appreciate what she’s doing.
Epicus Doomicus Metallicus (1986) by Candlemass
The search for the “beginning” of a particular genre can be really fraught with difficulties, from the sheer effort of figuring out which albums might be the best candidates, to the inevitable bickering over alternatives or whether or not the artist is close enough to that genre. Given that no genre was ever invented whole …
Raising Hell (1986) by Run-D.M.C.
Full disclosure, as usual: I know little about hip hop. But, that being said, the more I learn about hip hop the more I get at least some idea of what matters and what doesn’t. And I feel like I might be able to say that this has to be one of the most consequential …
Top Gun Original Motion Picture Soundtrack (1986) by Various Artists
Like everyone else my age, I have seen Top Gun more than a few times. Unlike virtually every other boy my age, I didn’t like it. I think it’s because I recognized it was dumb but more because everything else I knew seemed to love it. And I was already watching old war movies and …
The Singing Detective (1986)
Had I encountered this remarkable TV miniseries in my 20s, when I had my highest tolerance for meta commentaries on storytelling, I might have lost my mind over it. However, that tolerance has waned over the years and I struggled with it instead.
Victorialand (1986) by Cocteau Twins
Though they’re missing a member, this almost feels like the Cocteau Twins at their purest or most essential.
Candy Apple Grey (1986) by Husker Du
This is the last of the classic (i.e. everything but their debut) Husker Du albums I’ve listened to. And, not coincidentally, it seems to be the least well regarded. (I regularly start with bands’ best regarded albums.)
Liberty Belle and the Black Diamond (1986) by The Go-Betweens
Oh yay, another Australian jangle pop record from 1986.
Parade: Music From the Motion Picture Under the Cherry Moon (1986) by Prince
I have never seen Under the Cherry Moon, just like I haven’t seen his other movies. But everything I read says that this is a lot better than the movie, so I should be okay.
Born Sandy Devotional (1986) by The Triffids
There’s this weird thing which happens with what we might call “colonial bands,” specifically bands from Australia, Canada, New Zealand, places like that. If these bands produce decent music, British and American critics sometimes lose their shit, as if they cannot imagine such small, quaint countries producing decent music. I understand why we Canadians lose …
Please (1986) by Pet Shop Boys
As I have said many, many times, I don’t like synthpop. And one thing I can say about the Pet Shop Boys is that they love synthpop. They lean into it perhaps more than any other synthpop band that came along later in the history of the genre. (I am speaking from ignorance here so …
Black Celebration (1986) by Depeche Mode
The theoretical appeal to me about Depeche Mode was always that they were moodier and “darker” than other synthpop bands. But I must admit it took me some time to get there, both because it’s synthpop (a genre I don’t particularly like) and because their distinctness from other synthpop bands has always been somewhat overblown. …
The Colour of Spring (1986) by Talk Talk
I have come at so many bands backwards, listening to their peak stuff before their early stuff, and it really distorts a band’s evolution. But few bands changed as much as Talk Talk in their somewhat brief existence did and so it’s extra ridiculous that I’ve come at their discography completely backwards and it makes …
Control (1986) by Janet Jackson
I need to preface this by saying that I only know “New Jack Swing” as a name, I don’t really know anything about the genre and its history and have added it as a label to my reviews only when told by someone that “this music is New Jack Swing.” But if it’s true, it’s …
Different Light (1986) by The Bangles
I was moderately pleasantly surprised by the debut, having associated this group band mostly with “Walk Like an Egyptian” (on this record) and “Eternal Flame” (not on this record). But whatever surprise I got from the debut has disappeared this time around.
Kagel: Pan; String Quartets I-III (2004) by Arditti String Quartet
This disc collects the first three of Kagel’s quartets and pairs them with a piece he wrote for string quartet and piccolo. (Dietmar Wiesner guests on that piece.)